


Life’s A Drag

by InfaWrit10



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alcohol, Crack Treated So Seriously It's Not Crack Anymore, Drag Queen AU, Explicit Language, General warnings:, I challenged myself to write a book in a year and this is it, M/M, Morally Gray Deceit | Janus Sanders, Remus is mentioned like once or twice, Self-Improvement, Slow Burn, graphic depictions of panic attacks, more specific warnings will appear in the notes of each chapter, no beta we die like men, not gonna lie I'm sad he's not in this, repeated mentions of sexual content, tbh Janus and Virgil are both a bit morally gray, the difference is that Virgil is trying his best to be good and I don’t know what Janus is doing, this is probably the most explicit non-smut fic that does not feature Remus in any way
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:41:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29599839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfaWrit10/pseuds/InfaWrit10
Summary: Virgil has more than a few stressful specters hanging over him.  The ever-present need to pay rent, the repression of a three-year crush, an evil ex living in the apartment just underneath him, and the long-awaited, yet incredibly isolating marriage of his two best friends all leave him feeling off-balance.  Glimmering brightly before him as a welcome change in a sea of routine anxieties, in a place that might not be as unreachable as he thinks, lies the brilliant world of drag.  With his background in makeup and the help of old, bizarrely altruistic enemies pulling him in a suspiciously good direction, he might just be able to pull it off.In a constant tug of war with his anxiety over what’s good for him, Virgil struggles to balance his needs for isolation and connection with every performance.  He retraces the ins and outs of holding a secret, and remembers that he hasn’t yet learned how to deal with the guilt that comes with it.Win or lose, life’s a drag.  Might as well have fun with it.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Deceit | Janus Sanders, Dr. Emile Picani/Sleep | Remy Sanders, Logic | Logan Sanders/Morality | Patton Sanders
Comments: 9
Kudos: 5





	Life’s A Drag

**Author's Note:**

> On February 16th, 2020, I opened a new document and decided to write this ridiculous idea I had for a Drag AU crack fic, inspired by an answer Thomas gave during a Q and A back in... I think 2017? A fan asked what his and Joan’s drag names would be, and for fun, they threw out Virgil’s, too. I thought it would be fun to make a joke-y oneshot running with the idea.
> 
> I blacked out, and then suddenly I had challenged myself to write a book in a year, and I had written 7 some-odd chapters.
> 
> On February 16th, 2021, I had finished the rough draft, and therefore accomplished my goal of being able to write an entire full-length novel in a year.
> 
> So, hello, hello!
> 
> I am SUPER excited to FINALLY be sharing this with the rest of the fandom! After a solid year of work, I can finally put this out there to the world and see what you lovely people think! I think it still has its issues, but I’m getting to the point where I’m making it worse by editing it too much, so here it is! I’m not entirely sure when Chapter 2 is going up because edits still have to be made to the entire rest of the fic that will impact what happens in other chapters, but the fic is done, so no fear of this going on hiatus or anything!
> 
> Bear in mind as you read though that this story was EXTREMELY experimental for me as a writer. This was a very ambitious project and very outside of my comfort zone, so if you see anything offensive, ill-represented, or anything that just seems weird, please let me know and I will rectify it to the best of my ability because the LAST thing I would ever want to do is misrepresent or offend. This was a learning experience for me, and getting feedback from you would be the best way to learn :)
> 
> Oh! Also, a few shout-outs to the people who kept me going through this project. Liv, Hailey, Minx and Code, you all are stars, and I absolutely ADORE you. Thank you for listening to my lengthy, out-of-context rambles, and offering such unfailing support when I felt like I was going to lose my mind with this project. Thank you, and I hope you enjoy.
> 
> Some warnings for this chapter!  
> -Aliens mentions  
> -Food mentions  
> -Very slight mentions of sexual content  
> If there’s anything I missed, please let me know.
> 
> FINALLY, without further adieu, please enjoy the first chapter.

_The future is terrifying,_ Virgil thought, having known that going into this, but the affirmation was nice, he guessed. He narrowed his eyes with uncomfortable distaste at the unnecessarily long alien invasion sequence before his eyes. _If this is what sci-fi predicts the future’s gonna be, then we might as well kiss Earth goodbye now._

Having seen enough, he craned his neck from where he lay on Roman’s plush couch, finding the man nodding off on the other side.

Despite himself, Virgil softly smiled. Their legs were intertwined—which was Roman’s fault, for the record—one of Virgil’s legs trapped between both of Roman’s, while the other was slung off the couch and onto the floor. What was really precious, though, was that Roman was falling asleep so comically, with his head intermittently bobbing and everything.

Virgil did a mental check-in, making sure his hands were just as poorly circulated and cold as always. Noting that they were, he trailed his gaze to where Roman’s feet clamped down around Virgil’s thigh. He calculated the likelihood of Princey’s reaction hurting him, and figured he would probably be fine.

Carefully, so the sensation would inch along the periphery of Roman’s awareness, Virgil spider-crawled two fingers over the top of Princey’s sock-clad foot. He held for just a second, before he snatched Roman’s ankle, causing his friend to jolt and shout. As Virgil had thought, his one leg couldn’t move because it was pinned between the underside of Virgil’s thigh and the couch, and Virgil was clutching the other one. No harm done, just a little scare. Fantastic.

When Roman turned his surprised expression on him, Virgil only smirked devilishly and said, “Look alive, sunshine.”

Groggily, Roman rubbed his face. “You suck,” he grumbled behind his palms.

“And you keep hanging out with me,” Virgil countered, maneuvering off the couch to get some more iced tea from the kitchen behind them. “How close were you to actually falling asleep?”

“Pretty close,” Roman managed as he stretched. “Did I miss anything?”

“A raunchy sex scene between Super-Not-Gay Astronaut Boy and Mandatory Female Love Interest, plus the inevitable end to humanity,” Virgil boredly supplied. “You want iced tea?”

_“Eugh,_ no thanks,” Roman replied, mainly to Virgil’s first comment.

Virgil perched onto the armrest when he came back, knowing Roman was going to ask him to hand him the remote minutes after he sat back down, anyway, just to be annoying.

Instead, Virgil watched the really stupid movie in peace for a few long moments, and was contemplating going back to his spot when Roman blurted, “Can I do your makeup?”

Virgil slowly turned his head to Roman and cocked a brow. “... What?”

“I know you enjoy putting it on. I’ve scarcely ever seen you without it,” Roman remarked.

_Yeah, there’s a reason for that,_ Virgil thought with a touch of bitterness. Acne scarring, general aesthetic, the blatant disregard for and total metaphorical middle finger to what society deemed acceptable for a man, acne scarring.

“And I do know a thing or two about it myself,” Roman continued, never one to miss an opportunity to toot his own horn.

“No.”

“Why not?” Roman whined.

“Because whether it’s good or bad, you’re going to insist on taking me out somewhere to parade me around like a show pony.”

Roman could be very bad at lying sometimes. With an unconvincing, faux-innocent grin, he scoffed, “I would _never—“_

“You would either take a picture and shoot it over to Patton and Logan to show them how bad it is, or to a bar to show me off to cute guys where I will definitely lose my mind the second one tries to actually talk to me.”

“That’s—“

_“And,_ since I’ll be a stuttering mess, you’ll swoop in and try to save me, and the guy who tried to talk to me will think you’re super charming for some unknown reason and—“ Virgil reflexively smacked a pillow aimed at his head out of the air and onto the ground with a chuckle. “—and decide to take you home with him instead. So I’ll not only be out of a date, but I’d also be out of a ride home, so I’d have to pay a cab fare.”

“Virgil, I could make you look so hot, he wouldn’t even see me. And that is _saying_ something, considering how ruggedly handsome I look all the time.” True to form, he never missed an opportunity.

Virgil rolled his eyes. Roman’s ego wasn’t all blown smoke—there was no doubt the guy loved himself—but most of his cocky bravado came from overcompensation and insecurity. Honestly, Roman _really_ didn’t have anything to be insecure about—except maybe his ego, ironically—but Virgil knew a bit too much about being your own worst critic to really blame him for it.

“But you won’t,” Virgil confirmed.

“I won’t what?”

“Make me look hot.”

Roman slyly grinned. “Well, if you insist.”

Sometimes, it caught Virgil off-guard how clever Roman could be. Their friend-group often improperly pegged him as the dumb one, but then he pulled some creative shit like that, and suddenly they all felt far dumber than they ever pegged him to be. Their friend, Patton, often suffered the same fate.

“Wh—Hey!” Virgil protested, flustered.

“I won’t do anything too crazy, I promise,” Roman assured him.

Virgil didn’t believe that. This was Roman, Prince Primadonna of the Kingdom of Dramatics. “Roman…”

_“Please_ let me do it, I’m _so_ bored,” Roman complained, gesturing to the television. “This movie has all the length of _The English Patient_ and all the depth of a kiddie pool. I need _something_ to keep me from falling asleep!”

“I _told_ you we should just watch _Beetlejuice,”_ Virgil smugly reminded him.

Roman groaned with displeasure. “That movie’s _weird_ and creepy… Like you.”

Virgil made a clicking noise with his mouth as he winked. “They made a musical about it though,” the emo pointed out, trying to bait his friend.

“Meh,” Roman mumbled noncommittally.

“Woah,” Virgil smirked. “Do I detect a hint of criticism toward a musical?”

“I don’t hate it, it’s just not my favorite,” Roman grumbled, with a pointed stare. “And I can critique stuff I like.”

“No, you can’t,” Virgil decisively corrected him.

“You’re trying to distract me from my question, and I don’t appreciate it.”

“You know we’re talking over the movie—“

_“Pleeeeaase?”_ Roman somehow sang and whined simultaneously. Very quickly, he added, “If you hate it, we can take it right off.”

“That just wastes your makeup,” Virgil pointed out.

“It’s not a waste. It’s an adventure!” The dramatic dork cried, gesturing grandly into the middle-distance before pointing to his friend. “It’s you trying something new!”

Virgil quirked a brow at him from underneath his bangs, slouching further into his patented tired hunch. “Princey, need I remind you how well I deal with new things?”

“But this is so low-stakes, and now that I’ve come up with the idea I _really_ wanna run with it, so please?”

Virgil gave Roman a dead stare before caving into an uncertain grimace.

Roman hopefully bit his lip.

The emo burst into a sigh and hung his head, disappointed in his own uncharacteristic lack of resolve. He couldn’t help it; this movie was boring… and it didn’t help that it was Roman he was caving to. Begrudgingly, Virgil had to admit the idiot was kind of irresistible in his own moronic way. Through a groan he relented, “Ugh, go get the stuff.”

Roman pumped a victorious fist. “Yes! Thank you, thank you! You’re gonna look—“

_“Go,”_ Virgil insisted, twisting his mouth into a snarl so he wouldn’t smile, directing it at Roman’s back as he sped down the hallway, giggling. “Before I change my mind!”

He watched Roman sock-slide-skid past the bathroom like the dork he was, and snorted softly to himself.

Virgil had a quiet, subtly smiling moment to himself, staring into the couch cushions, thinking of nothing in particular.

Roman settled before him minutes later with a makeup kit in hand. Virgil turned the movie off, slunk back down onto the couch cushions, and turned on a Panic! playlist. Panic! at the Disco was one of the only bands Roman and Virgil agreed on. Roman forever salivated over Brendon Urie’s range and performance skills, while Virgil clung to emo culture… and also inevitably wound up salivating over Brendon Urie’s range and performance skills.

“Camisado” popped up, and Virgil bobbed his head back and forth with a slight smile, mouthing the words out of pure amusement. He hadn’t heard this one in a while.

“Stop moving,” Roman muttered with a hint of amusement, preparing the blush since Virgil was already wearing foundation.

The music crashed back in with its upped tempo, and Virgil ramped up his severity of annoyance by rolling his shoulders into it. His dancing pulled him out of Roman’s hands, which were now fumbling to catch Virgil’s face.

“Ugh, you’re such a jerk!” Roman whined affectionately.

Virgil stopped, and sat upright again to give Roman a small opening, but he knew that Roman wouldn't be able to help but sing along to Urie’s stunning falsetto.

Then again, Virgil couldn’t help himself either, though he was much quieter about it.

Roman seized the opportunity and Virgil’s face with one hand, the blush brush wielded in the other.

Virgil continued making Roman’s job a living nightmare by continuing on mouthing to the song and his slight head movements. By the time he’d gotten bored with that, the song had changed. “LA Devotee,” one of Roman’s favorites. It wasn’t Virgil’s favorite track, but he could still appreciate it enough.

To throw Roman off his game, Virgil would make random faces at him whenever he felt like it.

“Do you _want_ me to screw up your face?” Roman asked.

“No, but I think _your_ face’ll be priceless when you do,” Virgil teasingly smirked.

“O, ye of little faith,” Roman chastised, jokingly pitying Virgil. The emo stuck his tongue out at him, not needing pity. “Look up, imp,” demanded the makeup artist, and Virgil almost looked down just to spite him that little bit, but Roman’s thumb and pointer finger were holding his chin so delicately now that he lost all thoughts of chaos.

“Don’t call me an imp. I don’t have wings,” Virgil mumbled, focusing on each stroke of mascara.

Roman paused in painting Virgil’s face, rearing back in confusion. “Aren’t fairies the ones with wings?”

“Don’t imps have ‘em too? Wait, no, you might be right. So what do imps do, then?”

Roman considered it. “I’d say they cause general chaos without having wings. Blink, see if that feels like it’s caked on.”

Coyly, Virgil made a show of batting his eyelashes. “When do I ever cause chaos?”

_“Um!”_ Roman scoffed. “Like, just ten seconds ago? Does that ring any bells, Quas-emo-do?”

_“Besides_ when I’m with you,” Virgil assented that small bit.

“Oh, because that doesn’t count?”

“Exactly, now you’re getting it.”

“B.S.!”

“We fuck with each other, it doesn’t count. You provoke me.”

“I do _not—!”_

“Don’t even say that you don’t Roman because you _so do—!”_

And with that they launched into one of their typical quick-paced, short-lived arguments where they shouted over each other ceaselessly, allowing the other no room to make their point. It ended with a breathless Virgil falling back on the couch, and allowing himself a barely-there laugh.

Roman tapped his knee to alert him to the hand he offered to help him back up. “I maintain that even _if—“_ Roman paused to grunt as he pulled Virgil back into a sitting position. “—it’s only with me, I still think that makes you an imp.”

Virgil cocked his head. “What ever happened to self-identification and individualism?”

“Please, you’re hardly a person.”

“What am I then—?”

“An imp,” they concluded in unison, Virgil begrudgingly, because he’d walked into that one, and Roman, emphasizing it like the obvious fact it was.

“Right,” Virgil conceded. He resignedly sighed. “Well then, I guess I’m an imp.”

“I guess you are,” his friend smugly declared.

Roman’s phone pinged, and as he reached for it, Virgil mumbled, “Gotta read up on my imp lore.”

Momentarily taking his attention away from reading the text, Roman addressed Virgil. “Oh yes, your knowledge of the supernatural has failed you for the first time. It must be difficult to mend that hole in your pride.”

Virgil gaped at him. “Look at the narcissist who’s talking. And besides, I stick to cryptids, I don’t go so far as to—“

Roman shrieked upon looking at the text.

Virgil jumped. “What?! What is it?!” Knowing Roman, he probably reacted like that out of excitement, but it was Virgil who was interpreting the reaction, and he couldn’t ever help but worry.

Roman spazzed in an excitable bounce on his couch. “Patton and Logan got engaged!”

An ecstatic jolt zapped through Virgil. _“What?!_ Shut up! Gimme the phone!”

Roman turned the screen so they both could see. Patton had sent photos in the group chat with the four of them—Fam-ILY, it was called. They’d been visiting Logan’s family who lived a few states away. Sometimes, Roman and Virgil were also invited on those trips, but Roman—as always—was a part of a show at the local theater that he needed to stay in town for, and Virgil was unemployed and job-hunting.

Patton didn’t let them miss anything. They scrolled through the selfies of the happy couple and the gold band Patton was showing off—some captioned with adorably saccharine things from Patton like, “Man, Logan and his family really _banded_ together to pull off this surprise!” and “Can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with this incredible man,” each littered with no less than six heart emojis. It gave their two friends so much happiness that Logan and Patton would be able to feel from four states over.

As they scrolled, Patton sent a short video that Roman immediately clicked on.

Apparently, Logan’s mom had hung out in the shadows a few feet away from the storm door as Logan proposed on the porch, and she caught everything on film, even with the sunset behind them that casted ugly shadows over certain parts of her shot.

The boys cooed and chuckled at the display, especially at Patton’s reaction—poor man had almost fallen into the outdoor rocker in shock.

“So they’re getting married,” Virgil concluded.

“They’re getting married! Oh, how marvelous that is. It’s about damn time,” Roman sighed, continuing to watch as Patton pulled Logan into a tight embrace, shouting “Yes!” several times over.

“Yeah,” Virgil agreed, gaze still on the video. “How long have they been together now?”

_“Five years,”_ Roman emphasized.

Virgil nodded approvingly. “Yeah, that’s about time.”

“Yeah,” Roman sighed, staring wistfully at the happy couple, who were now blissfully pressing their foreheads together, and blocking out the setting sun.

Virgil couldn’t help but glance over at him. His two best friends were getting married after being together for _five years_ , and he still hadn’t even _confessed._ He remembered watching as Patton and Logan pined for each other, and now they were getting _married,_ and he was still single with a lot of feelings. He’d been in love with Roman for long enough; he’d been trying to shake this hopeless crush for about three years now. One would think, at some point, he would have gotten fed up and made a move.

One does not know Virgil Wright, Lord of Anxiety, who would much rather feel feelings in overwhelmingly awful waves of dread, and only get a few more years in him before he inevitably died from stress in his early thirties.

“‘We’re so… happy… for… you two…’” Roman mumbled as he typed, then he perked up with a sudden gasp, but that wasn’t enough of a warning for Virgil.

“I’ve got an idea!” Roman bellowed.

Virgil, who ducked in response to the outburst, grumbled, “Yeah, I see that.”

“We should finish your makeup and send them a video! Or, better yet, Skype them!”

Virgil groaned, but wasn’t necessarily against the Skype idea. Skype was impermanent; a video was evidence. “Better hurry up then,” he merely said. “If it’s sundown over there, then they’ll only be up for a few more hours.”

“It won’t take me hours to do your makeup,” Roman assured him.

Virgil’s brows shot up. “No? Um, how distracted do you get by absolutely nothing?”

Roman leveled Virgil with an unamused glare. “Ouch,” he said.

“Thoroughly wrecked,” Virgil replied, grinning malevolently.

“It takes a lot more than that to wreck me, sir! And don't forget that you have your distractions, too, Grunkle tumblr Stan!” 

“Oof,” Virgil huffed, screwing his eyes shut against his cringe.

The next song that shuffled in was “Vegas Lights,” and Roman reminded Virgil of the time a few years ago when Virgil was studying for his bartender certification exam. He had sent Roman a snap where the countdown at the beginning of “Vegas Lights” played over a shot of Virgil’s cluttered desk. At the drum beat signaling the kickoff to the song, Virgil’s forehead abruptly smacked into his desk in total, knowledge-swamped misery.

Roman had laughed about it for _days._

The brief headache it had caused Virgil had nothing on the fluttering in his heart that resulted from hearing how happy that stupid little video made Roman. He smiled when Roman brought it up.

Slowly but surely, Roman finished the job, and sat back to admire his own handiwork.

He seemed to be admiring it for a little too long.

“What?” Virgil asked.

Roman smirked. “There’s something on your face…” he whispered amusedly.

“Oh, hahahahaha. Funny,” Virgil deadpanned. “Why are you _actually_ staring at me?”

Roman covered his pensively pursed lips with his fingers, notedly without answering Virgil’s question. Suddenly, he got up and walked back down the hall to his bedroom. 

_“Princey,”_ Virgil urged, getting up and following him.

When he got there, he realized that’s what Roman wanted him to do.

As soon as Virgil approached him, Roman—biting his lip with an excited gleam in his eyes—turned from his closet holding his leather jacket.

“This is such a look, and I think you’d look awesome in this.”

Virgil cocked a brow, then flicked his gray irises to the mirror. Did he really look that good? How ham did Roman go on his face?

Before Virgil’s eyes could make any meaningful, non-blurry contact with his reflection, Roman’s hand—still bearing the jacket—shot out in front of the glass.

“Not until you put this on,” Roman insisted.

Annoyed, Virgil deflated a little. “Really? It wasn’t enough to give me a makeover, but now you want me to play dress-up, too?”

“Leave the dramatics to me, Simon Scowl,” Roman teased. “It’s just a jacket, it’s not like I’m asking you to change completely.”

Virgil grumbled warily and hunched further into his beloved patchwork hoodie.

Roman fiddled with the jacket in his hands idly and he sighed. “I know your hoodie is your security blanket, but—“

_“Fine,”_ Virgil groaned, pointing at Roman. “But you take a picture, and I’m shoving a pillow into your face tonight. And I assure you Princey,” Virgil leaned in close, and with a dark ominous voice, added, “I will not let go.”

Roman blinked, fazed for only a second. “You know, you keep talking, but all I’m hearing is, ‘Take a picture of me! I put up an aloof front, but I secretly love attention!’”

“Princey, you’re taking your life in your hands,” Virgil warned.

“I could go up against you a hundred times in a physical fight and I would win every time. I’m not exactly threatened by your twig-like stature.” Roman’s eyes did a quick once-over of his friend to emphasize his point.

In response, Virgil continued scowling, the blush in his cheeks darkening with shame, and not because of Roman inadvertently checking him out, thank you. “Just because you’re right doesn’t mean you should say it.”

“Why, because it pokes more holes in your point than teenagers with their DIY hoodie thumb holes in the 2000s?” Roman asked with an accompanying roll of his wrist.

Virgil scowled at him. “That could’ve been more concise.”

“Put the jacket on,” Roman commanded.

Rolling his eyes and still scowling, Virgil shrugged off his warm hoodie, balled it up, and threw it on Roman’s bed.

“Gimme the freakin’ jacket,” he muttered, snatching the thing from a delighted Roman.

He carefully shrugged the jacket on, and was surprised to find the fit a bit more snug than he thought it would be. Roman was way more built than he was, and Virgil was used to wearing baggier clothes. It really shouldn’t have fit him as well as it did. Maybe it was from when Princey was younger and less muscular.

He stepped in view of the mirror.

“Woah,” he awed before he could catch himself. _Damn, my cheekbones can look like that?_ He immediately stepped closer to curiously study himself.

He marveled at his image, toughened by the jacket, and sharpened by the wings on his eyelids. As Virgil examined himself, playing with his hair as he did so, Roman gave him an explanatory, subtly panicked voice-over.

“I don’t know if I overdid it with the eyes. I wanted to kind of emulate your usual… thing you have going on, and I meant to accent it with purple and the shade kind of _looked_ purple on the palette but it came out red for some reason but I’m not, like, mad about it because you sort of _slay_ when you wear red, not gonna lie, and—“

Virgil tore his gaze away for long enough to assure his friend, “Roman, you don’t need to make excuses. It looks good.”

Roman paused, allowing the praise to sink in before raising a suggestive brow. “You mean _you_ look good.”

Virgil turned his head back again to share one meaningful glance with Roman before immediately turning back to watch himself shrug in the mirror.

“I mean, I guess…”

“Virgil,” Roman urged.

“Ugh…” Virgil sighed. Resignedly, he slurred a whisper, “I loogood…”

“Not good enough,” Roman chirped.

_“Thank you,_ Roman,” Virgil glanced at Roman in the mirror as he shyly rubbed his neck.

Roman gave it up, knowing that was the best he was going to get. The reflections shared a smile.

“We should call Pat and Lo,” Virgil prompted, just so the attention could be off of him.

“On it!” Roman announced.

Virgil casually fled the scene, strolling back down the hall and into the kitchen to pick at some of the fried noodles they’d received in their Chinese takeout earlier.

“Aaah! This is such spectacular news!” Roman squealed at his phone after a few seconds.

Virgil was able to hear him crystal clear, even though Roman was still in his room. He looked back down the hall as he crunched on a noodle and smirked to himself. Roman had neighbors—neighbors who were probably pissed at him being so loud all the time.

“I’m so excited to see wedding plans and everything, you have _no_ idea,” Roman continued talking as Virgil continued munching.

“You two really are wonderful together, I’m so happy for you.” A pause. “Nothing’s really new over here,” Roman shrugged as he began to follow Virgil’s path into the kitchen. “I did Virgil’s makeup earlier.”

Roman held up his phone to Virgil's head, but Virgil was quick to hunch in on himself and hold up a hand.

“No pictures,” he huffed on a deniable laugh. Once he gave up on not being seen, he added. “Pat, Lo, I’m so happy for you guys. I can’t think of anyone who’s more in love with their partner and more deserving of that love than you two.”

No response.

Virgil looked between Roman and his phone. “What is it, bad connection or something?”

When Roman didn’t answer, Virgil thought about it.

Roman grinned at the sight of his realization.

Virgil was on him in a flash, grabbing for him or his phone, whichever came first. When that didn’t work, his legs went to work tailing him immediately as the cowardly prince made a mad dash back to his room. “Roman, delete that! Delete it now!”

The door slammed in his face, so he gave three succinct bangs on Roman’s door. “Roman!”

Just as Virgil was about to kick the door, Roman calmly stepped out, offering his phone to Virgil. “There, all proof that you’re secretly a soft and sappy sweetheart is gone from my camera roll. Check for yourself if you don’t believe me.”

“You sent it to them already, didn’t you?” Virgil deadpanned.

Roman held up his hands in a placating gesture. “It’s just in my Memories, and I sent it to you.” His hazel eyes ping-ponged to different spots in the room before admitting, “And Patton and Logan.”

Virgil sighed, annoyance flooding out of him. “Well, there goes my edge. Could be worse though, you could’ve posted it on your Story.”

“It’s a crying shame! Why don’t you want people to see my artistry?”

“Because your artistry is currently vandalizing my face,” Virgil replied flatly.

“It’s hardly vandalizing. You said it looked good,” Roman pointed out.

“I know what I said,” Virgil defended confidently.

“So which was the lie?”

“Neither,” Virgil told him, playfully and unconvincingly.

“Virge,” Roman pleaded, insecurity at the forefront.

Virgil held his gaze for a moment before snagging the noodles off the counter and whistling as he made his way toward the couch. If he was whistling a slower version of “Chim Chim Cher-ee,” then no one needed to know.

They actually did call Patton and Logan after that, staying on for an hour and a half with the fiancés before they turned in. Patton fawned over how good Virgil’s makeup looked. Logan, even for all his strictly objective vocabulary, commented that it looked nice. As if he hadn’t been colored red up to the forehead already, Roman’s steady, proud gaze was like a laser pointed directly at Virgil’s heart that didn’t stop making it melt until he looked away and the subject changed. Virgil was thankful that he’d kind of overdone it a little on his foundation that day, because it had a better chance of hiding his blush.

The couple had seen the video Roman had sent them, and thanked the boys for their sweet messages. They each rehashed the proposal in their perspectives, and as usual, they all laughed with each other.

Afterwards, when the newly engaged couple went to bed, they went through Roman’s Snapchat Memories, which brought on a lot of cringe from Virgil and a lot of cooing and laughter from Roman. It wasn’t until about 3 a.m. that Virgil decided to venture to the bathroom and take the makeup off.

Although, before he told Roman he could brush his teeth and get ready for bed, he did examine his friend’s work one more time, and—against his better judgement—took a commemorative selfie.

**Author's Note:**

> Think Roman did a good job on Virge’s makeup? Wanna congratulate Patton and Logan on their engagement? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you.


End file.
